I just want to say, this isn't strictly true. We've banned certain specific kinds of weapons in the past (while not banning others), we've passed "gun laws" -- a recent example I can think of is this one -- but you'll notice that the act, well-meant as it may have been, expired in 2004. And it only had to do with semis. Diving into US gun control legislation research is vomit-inducing -- here and here for a couple more resources -- and the overwhelming conclusion to be drawn is this: we are not strict on guns in this country. Not at all. This is the opposite of what you said. Take the Firearm Owners Protection Act. It's basically a wholehearted defense of free guns in this country, as based on the thoroughly outdated Second Amendment. (And I mean, read the name of the damn law.) Yeah, I agree. He is responsible for this, however, which includes background checks. (Considering he took a bullet from a gun bought at a pawn shop and fired by an insane man who was not background checked at all, I guess it fits.) There was also this, which might be considered slightly "preventive." The bottom line is that the NRA is one of the two most powerful independent lobbyists in the country, and any time it starts to lose an argument it can cite the Bill of Rights. Until one of those two things changes, nothing meaningful about our gun legislation will change. There are a couple of really good West Wing episodes about this, incidentally.We've passed gun laws, we've made it strict, but that doesn't solve the issue-- guns will end in the hands of criminals no matter what we do through illegal means and there are legitimate reasons for gun ownership.
No matter your politics, Reagan's measures against mental institutions dealt a devastating blow the country has not recovered from.
Actually rereading my own text I don't agree with it. I should have really stated more clearly that I know we aren't strict. We should be more strict, most definitely. I just don't know if that's enough in this country. We have a serious perception problem as well. I really need to watch West Wing. I keep getting reminded of that.
We do have a perception problem; I think that ties into the fact that this country was "built" on guns. We have a gun culture and a gun tradition that goes back to before we were a country. The Second Amendment is ... well, second. The founders considered guns the next most important thing after freedom of expression. And that made quite a bit of sense in 1789. Now it's beyond outdated -- it and some other anachronisms in the Constitution are seriously hurting the US.
Yes. Which is ... well, it's odd that this didn't occur to anyone when the Constitution was created. Like, we are setting up a sacred document that is relevant now but who knows what it will mean in 200 years. But at the time we needed something.
It was probably a simple oversight. After studying the Constitution so extensively, they seem up space for elasticity and change everywhere. Perhaps they didn't expect guns to change as they did. Mass production and global availability also weren't factors in their world.
I think I'm going to spend tomorrow taking an in-depth look at the Magna Carta and trying to find/not find parallels. EDIT: turns out the Brits have been able to largely slice and dice the MC to fit the times. But it took them several hundred years.
The Brits have a really cool system based mostly on precedent and intentionally don't have a central constitution. I took a class comparing their, Japan's, and our own constitutional systems. At first when hearing of Britain's system from an American perspective, it's incomprehensible. We've been entirely conditioned to believe that everything their system is based on will fail. We can't understand not having central documents without there being rampant corruption or solid written rules to dictate things. Every aspect of their politics is what we're told is wrong. I suppose it makes sense as it's what our ancestors intentionally left, but still being so opposed to it 200 years later is astounding.